Altered putter head with coins

[Robato]

Hi everyone. I can't find the answer to my question anywhere, so I'd like to try here.

I wanted to make one of my putter heads heavier, so I scotch-taped some coins to the bottom, in order to test it out.

It worked so good, I decided to glue the coins (some US quarters) to the bottom.

It this stayed on permanently, would this be legal to use in competition?

The quarters are just flat on the bottom, not visible unless I flipped the putter over.

[Laws of Woo]

I don't see why not, people use lead tape on the club heads to add weight all the time.

[Dormie1360]

Originally Posted by Robato

Hi everyone. I can't find the answer to my question anywhere, so I'd like to try here.

I wanted to make one of my putter heads heavier, so I scotch-taped some coins to the bottom, in order to test it out.

It worked so good, I decided to glue the coins (some US quarters) to the bottom.

It this stayed on permanently, would this be legal to use in competition?

The quarters are just flat on the bottom, not visible unless I flipped the putter over.

You could not scotch tape the coins because that would be an external attachment that was not fixed.  Lead tape gets a bye because it gets a specific exception in the decisions.

If you glue the coins on you've created a fixed attachement.  As long as it complies with appendix II "Design of Clubs" I'm guessing that it would be legal.  I can think of irons that use to have wt ports where you could glue in different weights that would permanently change the club's weight.

Having said that, I'm not an expert on this.  If it were me, I'd send an email or call the USGA on this.  They could tell you for sure.

[Dormie1360]

This reminds me of a story a rules official told me a while back.  Jim Furyk was playing in a tournament, it may have been a major.  Some of the details are a little foggy, but the gist of it was Jim made a stroke with his putter while one of those small magnetic ball markers was stuck to the club.  The marker was in his bag, or was dropped in his bag, and  got attached to his putter.  He noticed the marker and mentioned it to the rules official.  The rules official thinks, "oh sh&t;" and says something to the affect of I'll get back to you.

The next couple of hours are spent with discussions, phone calls, etc., trying to figure out the ruling.  All the while, Jim keeps playing, getting more perturbed because he doesn't know if he has a penalty or not.  He doesn't realize if he breached 4-2 the penalty is disqualification.  The rules official finally gets a confirmation on what to do, and if memory serves, no penalty.

I forget the details of the ruling (and the story.....Fluff can be rather humorous), I just remember it was a funny story as told by the official, with a happy ending.

[iacas]

Jim Furyk stuff:

http://www.jessebarge.com/pro/downloads/JimFurykRulesIncident.pdf

http://www.golfdigest.com/golf-tours-news/blogs/local-knowledge/2010/08/furyk-escapes-dq-after-putter-issue.html

Quote:

Furyk was marking his ball on the third green after a 50-foot birdie putt when he noticed that there was a piece of round metal adhered to the shaft of his Scott Cameron Studio Select putter. His first instinct was to suspect that one of the two removable weights on the sole of the putter had come loose. Instead, it was a magnet that had somehow become dislodged from his putter cover and found its way onto the club. He immediately called over a rules official, and figured it would result in a two-shot penalty for having an attachment on his club, which is a breach of Appendix II in the Rules of Golf.

"I told the official, 'One, I can't explain how it got on the shaft. Two I can't imagine it was on the shaft when I hit the putt because I would have noticed it.' But I had no idea how it got there," Furyk said. "I was telling him as much information as I knew."

[Kapanda]

Quite sure you'd have an issue with the US Treasury though, for tampering with money. Like, for more the same reasons why burning notes is illegal.

Just saying

[iacas]

Originally Posted by Kapanda

Quite sure you'd have an issue with the US Treasury though, for tampering with money. Like, for more the same reasons why burning notes is illegal.

Quick reading suggest that only applies when it's an issue of counterfeiting.

I'm fairly certain nobody's actually been arrested for burning money or for gluing quarters to their putter.

If tampering with money was illegal in cases like these, we wouldn't see these machines:

[zeg]

Originally Posted by iacas

Quick reading suggest that only applies when it's an issue of counterfeiting.

It's also illegal to destroy coins to recover their raw materials, at least in bulk. This became important when copper prices went high enough to make bulk destruction of pennies to sell the scrap metal economically viable.

[Kapanda]

Specifically, this is a violation of Title 18, Section 333 of the United States Code, which says that “whoever mutilates, cuts, disfigures, perforates, unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national banking association, Federal Reserve Bank, or Federal Reserve System, with intent to render such item(s) unfit to be reissued, shall be fined not more than $100 or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.”  The law is enforced by the Secret Service.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/7148966/ns/business-answer_desk/t/it-crime-burn-money/#.T75pe9VDya8

As a practical matter, of course, money burners are not easy to catch. If you find yourself in the woods trying to start a fire, and the only paper you’ve got is cash, you’ll probably get away with the crime. Just don’t light the match if you see a guy in a black suit with sunglasses talking into his sleeve.

[Robato]

Originally Posted by Kapanda

Specifically, this is a violation of Title 18, Section 333 of the United States Code, which says that “whoever mutilates, cuts, disfigures, perforates, unites or cements together, or does any other thing to any bank bill, draft, note, or other evidence of debt issued by any national banking association, Federal Reserve Bank, or Federal Reserve System, with intent to render such item(s) unfit to be reissued, shall be fined not more than $100 or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.”  The law is enforced by the Secret Service.

Intent huh. I intend to take the quarters off someday to play a video game.

[zeg]

Sure ya' do, big guy. If we let anarchists like you go willy nilly gluing coins to golf clubs, where will end up? No, no, it's off to Gitmo with you.

[Dormie1360]

Originally Posted by iacas

Jim Furyk stuff:

http://www.jessebarge.com/pro/downloads/JimFurykRulesIncident.pdf

http://www.golfdigest.com/golf-tours-news/blogs/local-knowledge/2010/08/furyk-escapes-dq-after-putter-issue.html

Thanks Erik,

Jesse is the official who told the story.  Furyk  was getting pretty upset.  There was something about Fluff in the story which I thought was humorous , but I don't remember what it was.  I guess it's not that happy of an ending if his game tanked because of the uncertainty of the ruling.  But in fairness to the officials, it was  a head scratcher.